So I’m quitting my job at APU to become a film composer, sort of.
Honestly, my goal right now is not necessarily to become a film composer as much as it is to be a film score orchestrator. I have no idea what the future holds, but I DO love the orchestra more than I necessarily love coming up with “original” melodies and being the main music man on a film. The whole thing is a bit daunting. But I kick butt at taking someone else’s idea and expanding it and writing beautiful things around it…that’s no problem…I could do it in my sleep…(hence the love for orchestrating).

So the current project I’m working on is not necessarily glamorous, but it is a TV movie, and I’ll get my first orchestrator credit for it (a shared credit, but a credit nonetheless). There are times when I’m pretty work focused and I’m just getting the job done. There are other times when I realize that I’m doing what I always dreamed I wanted to do, I take a second to sit back and look at where I’m at, and give thanks for my blessings. I may not be orchestrating at this very second, but I AM in a studio in West L.A. working on a film score. For this, I am thankful.

A little background:
I got this gig because the composer sent me along with 8 bars of a melody and some chords he had written and said to me “Show me what you can do with this…”. So I went home and pulled out my best tricks and whipped together a very majestic orchestration of his theme. He loved it. He used it in the film. But little did I know just how much he used it!

I was just sitting here doing some work and I came across this cue that had bits and pieces of some string lines and woodwind parts that I had written in my orchestration…this is probably the second or third cue that I’ve seen the exact music I wrote appear in…but it came as a pleasant surprise. I was listening and watching the film along with this music, and all of sudden I started hearing my stuff. It sounded so awesome with the film, I wanted to just jump up and down with my arms flailing in the air yelling “I WROTE THAT!! THAT’S MINE! I WROTE THAAAAAT!!” but no one is here. And it’s 2:30 in the morning…

So I’ll just jump up and down on the inside, be even MORE thankful, and keep working…

Side Note: I’m thoroughly annoyed with Jason Castro and Brooke on American Idol. Just go home already and let our top 3 be the Davids and Seyesha.
Sheesh.

On Tuesday I submitted my resignation to my boss in the Office of the Registrar at APU. On Friday, it was announced to my office (and it feels a little weird since I took Friday off to move…I wasn’t there when it was announced). My last day is May 3rd, our Spring Commencement day.

I am leaving because it is time in my career to pursue arranging/orchestration/film composing full time. I am getting enough opportunities to warrant me focusing my whole attention to this pursuit. It’s not quite enough to live on yet, but enough so that I need to work on it non-stop and be available when people DO call with work. A HUGE thank you to my wife who will get a job for a while to make up the difference in our salary and enable us to pay the rent! She rocks for being willing to go back to work. As soon as I mentioned that I felt like it was time to quit APU, her next words were, “OK, then it’s time for me to get a job!”. Didn’t even hesitate. She’s awesome like that. 

I am extremely fortunate to have worked in such a cool environment as APU. Not only is the institution amazing as a whole, but my office was probably the coolest one on campus. Seriously. Wonderful, hard-working, talented, fun people. I have learned a lot in the past two years, and made a lot of great memories with them. Some good, some bad…(HA). In honor of my departure, I compiled a list…

Top Ten Most
Memorable Moments as a Staff Member in the UG REG Office

1) My promotion to Associate Registrar.  

2) Erin Webb’s departure. She was my office mate for a year,
and taught me everything I know about the office and the programs we used. She
had a similar temperament and similar strengths as me, so working together was
a blast. We were productive and fun. Our office was the best…in it’s day.

3) The office “punking” me by pretending to call me to tell
me I’d won free coffee for life from Starbucks. I’m pretty sure this happened in my second week working there. It really set the tone for the future…

4) Taping a line down the middle of the office that Erin and
I shared, putting up signs (i.e. “Daniel’s Awesome Office”) and requiring that
people enter the door on our side of the office and not cross the line.

5) Watching “The Office” online in our office during the
30-minute lunch break on Fridays with several people.

6) The bonus check I received as a staff member after only
being at APU for a few days. At that point we were really tight on money, and I
had been praying for the Lord to help us make it through the next few weeks. I
was really stressed about it. That day I went to a community meeting at APU and they
announced a bonus check to all employees of $250 bucks. I cried. In my seat. In
the community meeting. (Small tears…and only for a minute—I don’t think anyone
saw…). It wasn’t the amount that was moving—but it was almost like a clear
message from the Lord to say “Trust me, I’ll provide”. And that—that was
what I needed that day…

7) A gift that was given to my by my direct supervisor when
I was the Articulation Administrator. The thing that was memorable about it was
the way she gave it, and the words that she spoke while giving it. I was
totally touched and moved. It was an incredible gift, although it was a small
one.

8) Winning all the time, at everything, until Scott showed
up (that jerk).
Just kidding. I love Scott…

9) Jon Wallace (APU’s President) responding to an email I
sent to someone else in jest about getting a statue of me at APU. I had just
made the very first articulation agreement in APU’s history, and I was
pridefully saying that I wanted my statue in this place and that high…and that
in the archives of history MY name would be listed as making the first
articulation agreement…someone forwarded the email to the entire president’s
cabinet…he responded…I FREAKED out…(I did not reply). 

10) Laughing a lot with Joe and Heidi. All the time. About
silly things. (and laughing with all of them, really…we did a lot of laughing
in that office, Praise God…)

 

 

 I am going to miss my UG REG friends!

Thank you ALL for a great two years! 

I won’t be a stranger, though. I will be teaching a class on Wednesdays and Fridays in the fall, so I’ll pop in and visit…

We are moving to Burbank this weekend! Yipee!

If anyone is around on Friday or Saturday and wants to help out, let me know! We certainly wouldn’t mind it at all!

There are some really cool things happening right now…I’ll have to tell you about them soon…

In the meantime, if you need to go to the Doctor, go to Doctor Laser!!!

EDIT ADD:

Go back and re-read the last paragraph of this blog entry. It makes NO sense.  HA…I was literally falling asleep on the keyboard when I was typing this. I would have just left it and gone to sleep, but I wanted to finish SO BADLY!
I would actually wake up with a million llllllllllllllllllllllls in a row…go back and delete them…aaaaaaand repeat….haha.
Seriously. Sometimes you just need to go to bed.

I have more on this post to talk about. Nathaniel actually did some awesome things yesterday and I want to brag about my little boy…

---

We just got in an accident on the way home from San Diego. It wasn’t that bad. A 20 year-old dude rear-ended us right around the 57/60 interchange. Frankly, with all of the driving we do, I’m surprised it didn’t happen earlier. Hopefully our insurance rates won’t be going up…but in all reality as SOON as it happened the first thought I had was concern for my family.
The REALLY funny thing is that we got hit really hard and the kids slept right through it. They have the uncanny ability to do that…we used to have Nertz games all hours of the night with lots of yelling and screaming…the kids slept right through it. I think it’s pretty amazing, really…

Church today was pretty cool. We had a really different setup on the stage and it felt strange but fun. We had a small group of high schoolers that put on this really powerful skit. It was a tear jerker for sure…We followed the skit with a song (Sing to the King) and I actually had a really hard time singing it second service because I was a mess. Check out a different church doing this same skit on youtube here…
The most emotional time in the skit for me was the last 60-90 seconds of it…just watch, and you’ll see why. I’m telling ya, if you’re not somehow moved by this thing, then you’re a robot and you have no heart.

God works in incredible ways.

Tonight we were driving home from San Diego and Nathaniel (in his normal state of just basically yammering on all of the time) asks Christy and I if we knew what our gift from God was…
We didn’t know exactly to what he was referring, so we started guess…salvation? Eternal life? Grace? ???
Turns out he was talking about something much more specific to us. He goes on to inform us of what our gifts are:

Daddy’s gift: playing piano
Nathaniel’s gift: singing
Mommy’s gift: greeting people and being very nice to them.
Noah’s gift: always being cute, hugging, and showing love.

Apparently we also have a gift of singing, but we can’t all have the exactly same gift, according to Nathaniel ‘s 411 and you barely read other ones, just admidt it.

“You gotta hear this one song, it’ll change your life I swear.”
-Garden State

my story to come…

Every once and a while, a truly remarkable and talented comedian comes along on SNL. Dan Akroyd, Phil Hartman, and Will Ferrell (among others) will be remembered for a long time as SNL greats…and I’m convinced that Kristen Wiig will soon be joining the list. This girl is hilarious–and I called it a looooong time ago, too…
Here are a couple of her winners from recent shows. SO funny…

So, who are your all-time favorite SNL cast members?

Tonight Christy is going to “Prism”, a big show at her old high school.
Of course this means tonight is another Daddy night…which means we will be eating cereal for dinner, playing PS2, and watching Empire Strikes Back.

I’m such a good dad.

So there is this super-silly re-occurring sketch on SNL called “Laser Cats”. It’s pretty stupid and funny.
But TODAY I found a little Laser Cats game on the SNL website…it’s pretty fun. It reminds me of the good ole Atari days…check it out!

We also heard back from the house people. It turns out that the owner did not expect to get an application for it that quickly. He’s raising the asking price by $250 bucks…and honestly, he should. It’s just going to most likely put it out of our already stretched range.
I haven’t responded with anything but an email saying we’re going to talk about it…but it doesn’t look good.
I’m a little bummed.
(ok, a lot bummed)

I need to go drown my sorrows with some Lego Star Wars II.